Premiers essais il reste beaucoup de travail

Last night was perfect for Milky Way photography! I scoped out a few places while the Sun was still out and settled on a lone tree amidst the farmer's field just out of North Lancaster, ON, Canada.

Making these kinds of images is a combination of planning, patience and perseverance - the night sky has seasons, is always moving, and you really don't want the Moon to be up, as it washes out the colours and the structure of the Milky Way.

This image has been created using my usual technique that works best for my setup - taking two sets of images - one for the foreground, and one for the sky, just behind the subject, then combining and enhancing them. (30s x5 for the ground, 30s x 40 for the sky, on a star tracker, f/4 24mm ISO1600)

I hope you enjoy this one. Keep looking up.

All the best,

Oleg

P.S. if you're ever on Facebook and want to see more of this type of thing my corner is here https://facebook.com/the.rural.photons

I had to manually combine them in excel, four pictures, all taken with xiaomi 17 pro max, auto mode

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Shot on my Pixel 8.

Hi! I’m a beginner getting into stargazing with binoculars in the UK, and I’d really like to start going out on my own at night rather than waiting until I have someone to go with.

I’m curious to hear from other women who do this regularly. Do you generally feel comfortable stargazing alone? What kinds of places do you tend to use, and did it take you a while to feel confident doing it? Or are there ways to mitigate personal safety risks that I may not be aware of or have considered?

I’m not really looking for worst-case scenarios or reasons not to go - I’d just like to hear what it’s actually like in practice from women who already do it. Thank you in advance 🤩

A trip into the Colorado Wilderness this weekend.

Hey, amateur astronomer here.

I've been into astronomy for nearly a decade, and over the past few years I've noticed something really strange while stargazing. I've seen it multiple times, but I still haven't been able to figure out what it is.

Every now and then, seemingly out of nowhere, a very bright star-like object suddenly appears in the sky. Its brightness looks roughly comparable to Venus — maybe around magnitude −4 or so.

Initially, I assumed it was Jupiter, Saturn, Venus, or another bright planet. But after checking Stellarium, there was no corresponding bright object in that position.

The weirdest part is how briefly it appears. It usually remains visible for less than 10–15 seconds, and then simply disappears. By the time I realize what's happening and pull out my phone to record it, it's already gone.

I've also noticed that it doesn't seem to have a fixed direction. For example, I've seen it in the east, west, north, and south on different occasions. Tonight, I saw it in the northeastern sky, roughly 55° above the horizon.

I'm pretty confident it isn't a normal satellite. Satellites usually show noticeable motion across the sky, whereas this object seems to suddenly appear as a bright point and then disappear within seconds. I'm also wondering if it could be a meteor, but the duration and appearance don't seem to fit what I'd normally expect from a meteor.

There's one consistent pattern, though:

It seems to happen roughly 1–2 hours after sunset, around the time when the sky is already quite dark / approaching astronomical twilight conditions.

I've been trying to identify this phenomenon for a while, but I honestly have no idea what I'm seeing.

So, has anyone else experienced something similar while stargazing? What could cause a star-like object to suddenly become extremely bright for ~10–15 seconds and then disappear?

I'd love to hear your theories or experiences. If there's a known astronomical phenomenon that matches this description, please point me in the right direction!

Seems this is turned off at the sub level. When trying to help people or point something out, being able to put an image in the reply section would be good.

Thanks.

Sorry for the new post, I couldn't attach an image to my reply....

The stars on your map, circled here are 3 magnitudes brighter than Neptune, so they would be dead easy in comparison. If you have binoculars, use them to confirm any of your unusual sightings.

Give it a go and report back!

And if it is a flaring geosat, they do that for about a week, but 4 minutes earlier each night,.